Wednesday 4 July 2018

The Migraine Pose

There has been a lot of talk recently on Instagram and Twitter about the so called migraine pose, here a blogger in collaboration with Elle defined what she called the migraine pose, she had her hand held against her head and looked kinda vacant, the shot was taken outside in direct sunlight.

Let me be clear, this was NOT a migraine pose, this was someone making fun of a serious neurological disease that effects a great many million people around the world, if it had been a #truemigrainepose she would have been in a dark room with an icepack or hot water bottle on her head or hunched over a toilet being violently sick!

Migraine is not a jock, it is completely and utterly debilitating, I've had migraine for nigh on 35+ years and believe you me I wish to God there was a cure or better research even, we've only now in the last 3 years seen a new medication thats been developed specially for migraine, everything else was made for something else and just so happened to help with migraine, so that included beta blockers for your heart, anti-depressant meds, meds for epilepsy plus botox to freeze the veins that constrict and dilate causing the pain.

I've lost jobs because of migraine, I've cancelled so many social events its a wonder my friends still ask me I even had a migraine on my own wedding day.

They are not cute or cool in any way shape or form.

Migraine can also kill you like strokes and epilepsy

Oh and just to be very very clear it is that painful, it wont go away with 2 over the counter pain meds and yes we try everything our doctors suggest to us because we do want to not feel like death warmed up..

When I have a migraine I feel hot then cold, nauseous, I cant stand loud noise or bright light, if I'm about to have one I get a super cold nose and feet, smells get more intense and sometimes I smell smoke that isnt there or a burning smell. Migraine is a whole body experience, I then can start to under urinate because my stomach has stopped processing things, which leads to vomiting, I get brain fog where I cannot focus on what someone is telling me or asking me

I try extremely hard not to let migraine control my life but you know sometimes thats impossible and I am confined to bed in agony for days at a time.

Migraine is stigmatised enough as its an invisible illness and if you've never had a migraine unfortunately you probably dont *get* migraine. I wouldn't wish migraine on my worst enemy because of the horror it brings me and no I am not being dramtic, think of the worse pain you ever had, child birth, a broken limb? now add in that it goes on for days, now add in a dose of food poisoning for that genuine feeling of nausea and vomiting, add in the worst hangover you've ever had the pounding head the nausea the sound thats too loud even when people whisper.... now thats kinda a migraine but triple it.

Also I cannot stress this enough we arnt faking it and when people say oh I have a migraine but i take 2 aspirin and it goes away, well honey that ain't a migraine, I've eaten painkillers like smarties and they havent even made a dent in the pain.

A headache is defined as not lasting longer than 2 hours and being controlled by over the counter meds.

A migraine is defined as lasting at minimum 4 hours and upto and over 72 hours, there are chronic daily headaches and chronic daily migraines too and something called Ice Pick Headaches which last seconds but are so excruciating that they are also known as the suicide headache because unfortunately by the time you've even just reached for a pain med its gone but it'll be back at exactly the same time tomorrow, people with icepack headaches can tell you exactly the time and date theirs started.

My #MigrainePose taken by my husband on the 3rd day of a migraine.



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